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- Rumours have emerged an official from the government of Italy has offered the Colosseum in Rome as a venue for the proposed cage fight between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg.
- The Colosseum's website claimed the last gladiator fight in it was held in 438 AD.
- The pair first started planning the cage fight in a cross-platform social media spat that started earlier in June.
- For more stories, visit the Tech and Trends homepage.
Rumours have emerged that an official from the government of Italy has offered the Colosseum in Rome as a venue for the proposed Tech billionaire cage fight between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg.
The Daily Mail reported Italian media have said the government denied this allegation, but this did not stop Musk from tweeting there was "some chance" the fight might happen in the Colosseum.
The Colosseum’s official website claimed the last gladiator fight in it was held in 438 AD.
It is unclear whether the fight will go ahead, but the pair first started planning the cage fight in a cross-platform social media spat that started earlier in June.
Musk responded to a Tweet claiming Facebook owner Meta was working on a social media network to compete directly with Twitter.
The BBC spoke to a Meta spokesperson who confirmed the platform was in development.
"I'm sure Earth can't wait to be exclusively under Zuck's thumb with no other options," Musk said, in response to the tweet.Following this, Musk said he "is up for a cage match if he is".
A few hours later, Zuckerberg responded using a story on the Meta-owned Instagram platform.
He posted a screenshot of Musk's tweet with a text block saying, "send location".
Musk responded in response to a different tweet on 22 June. "Vegas Octagon," he said at the time.
Vegas Octagon
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 22, 2023
The match-up
It would seem the cage fight is a bit of a mismatch.
Zuckerberg is 39 years old and recently competed in his first jiu-jitsu competition and won some medals, according to a recent Instagram post.He also said he completed a "Murph challenge" in under 40 minutes. This requires running a mile, doing 100 pull-ups, 200 push-ups, and 300 squats all while wearing a weighted vest.
In contrast, 51-year-old Musk said he almost never worked out other than when he threw his kids up in the air.
He added he had a "great move" called "The Walrus", where he lies on top of his opponent and does nothing.— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 22, 2023
In terms of wealth though, Musk is streaks ahead.
He recently retook the position of the world's wealthiest person, with more than double Zuckerberg's nearly US$100 billion net worth.
Zuckerberg is currently the 10th wealthiest person in the world.
It remains to be seen whether the Twitter exchange is just a joke, or whether the pair will go ahead with organising the fight.
